“Oh,” Decebel said and then smiled, hoping to bring her back to the moment. “So what you’re saying is, kissing me can make you wet?” His voice was dry and almost bored sounding, but Jen saw the wicked gleam in his eyes.
“Ha, ha, B. You’re so clever with your sexual innuendos and whatnot,” Jen said as she started to sit up.
“Where do you think you’re going?” Decebel asked as he pulled her back down on top of him.
“I’m going to find another shirt to wear. I’ll just grab something and be right back,” she told him as she tried again to push herself up.
“There’s no point in you putting on something dry, baby.”
“And why is that, Dec?”
“Because I’m not done with you. Whatever you change into will just get wet again.”
Jen laughed. “Can you imagine how this conversation would sound to someone who didn’t know we were talking about leaking breasts?” His deep laugh made her stomach flutter as she stared down at the man who had stolen her heart in a matter of days. “Remember when Jacque and I were in the hospital?” she asked, running her fingers through his hair, her wet shirt now forgotten.
“Which part?” he asked. “The part where you got drunk or the part where you attempted to climb me like a tree while you were wearing nothing but a sheet?”
“Since I don’t really remember that second one, let’s go with that part. What was that like?” Jen asked. She propped herself up on his chest, her chin resting in her hand.
“How did it make me feel to have an eighteen-year-old human—”
“Not totally human here, bud,” she interrupted.
“I didn’t know that at the time, now did I?” Decebel challenged.
“Touché, now carry on.”
“How did it feel to have an eighteen-year-old female who I believed to be human attempting to molest my leg?”
“Is that what we’re calling it?” She narrowed her eyes at him and raised her eyebrows suggestively. “Your leg?”
Dec smacked her butt, hard. “Behave female.”
She shrugged. “One day we will tell this story to our grandkids, so we have to have the details recorded correctly.”
“This is not a story we will ever tell anyone’s grandkids, least of all our own,” he said to her.
“And why not?” she asked. “It’s a part of our story, of how we came to be, which, in turn, is how they will have come to be.” She waggled her eyebrows at him.
“Do you want your parents to tell you how you came to be?” he asked, his brow raising as he stared at her. “Do you want your mom to share how your dad flapped his peacock feathers at her and strutted around until she was willing to let him fertilize her?”
“Oh, crap!” Jen caught herself as she nearly fell off the couch as the laughter rolled through her. “You’re like a Romanian nature channel narrator guy!” She ended up on her butt on the floor looking up at Decebel as she continued to try to catch her breath. When she could finally speak again, she spoke in her best Romanian accent. “Watch how the peacock releases its feathers in a spray of utter abandon as he attempts to capture the female’s notice. First, he moves left and then he moves right.” With each word, her voice deepened, taking on a sultry cadence. “He flicks his head back and releases a cry. It is the call to his mate. Come to me, he says, come to me and dance.”
“Dance?” Decebel’s brow drew into a deep V.
Jen chuckled and shrugged. “What were you expecting me to say? Come to me and sex?”
“I’ve given up trying to predict what you’re going to say, baby. I just try to roll with whatever comes out of your mouth,” Decebel said.
“Psht, you don’t roll with anything. In fact,” Jen said holding up a hand, “you are the exact opposite of someone who just rolls with things. You’re an anti-roller. Which would make you a square.” She shrugged. “You just need to own it.”
“Own that I’m an anti-roller?” Decebel frowned at her.
“Exactly. And a square.”
“How did we go from not telling our grandchildren about you climbing me like a drunk lumberjack to me being an anti-roller square?”
Jen laughed as she reached up to pat his cheek. “It’s tough to keep up with me because you’re so much older, but you’re going to have to try if you don’t want me looking for a younger werewolf lover.”
“A younger werewolf lover wouldn’t be able to handle you, and you’d get bored,” he said confidently.
“As much as I hate to admit it, you’re probably right.” She leaned back against the couch and sighed as he began to run his fingers through her hair. “She’s going to be alright, isn’t she?”
“I will accept no other outcome. So yes, she’s going to be alright,” he answered, and the calm in his voice helped Jen feel a little better.
“Then I guess it’s just hurry up and wait.” She sighed again and closed her eyes, soaking in the touch of her mate and trying her damnedest not to jump up and start screaming “the sky is falling,” even though that’s exactly what it felt like, like the whole world was crumbling down on top of her.
As soon as her lids were closed, she felt Dec jump and snarl. Jen’s eyes popped open to find Cyn standing in their suite with a wiggling, blue baby girl in her arms.
Chapter Twelve
“You can run but I will follow. You can hide but I will find you. You can, ah crap, you get the idea. If you mess with those under my care, I’ll take you out.” ~Perizada
Jen was on her feet in the blink of an eye, reaching for Thia. Immediately Cyn handed the girl over and gifted Jen with one of the fae’s rare smiles.
“She’s alright,” Cyn said. “Though I do not know what happened to make her blue.”
Jen laughed and stared down at her daughter through tear-blurred eyes. “Fane and Costin happened,” she said, and Thia’s eyes popped open and collided with hers. “Yes, you’re home mini-me,” Jen told her daughter who was beginning to squirm even more earnestly.
“Could you please bring me our pup.” Decebel growled. Jen turned to look at him and remembered that Peri had confined him to the couch.
“Thank you so much, Cyn,” Jen said as she walked over to her mate and lowered Thia into his arms. “There is nothing we could do to repay you for bringing her back to us, but we are in your debt. Yours and Peri’s.”
“You would do no less for us, Jen. There is no debt incurred from helping those we love,” Cyn said. “Peri should be back momentarily to fill you in on the details. First, she has a matter to which she must attend.”
“In other words, she’s taking out her anger on the kidnapper?” Jen asked.
Cyn smirked. “Something like that. Let Peri know I’m headed back to our realm.” She flashed, leaving Jen and Decebel alone with their daughter.
“I think she’s hungry,” Decebel said as Thia sucked voraciously at his finger.
Jen grabbed a receiving blanket from the stack that was sitting on the end table and sat down beside her mate. “Hand her over.”
Decebel passed Thia to her but added, “I get her back when she’s done.”
Jen went through the steps shown to her by the lactation specialist then forced herself not to squeeze the girl too tightly. There were no words to express what it felt like to hold her baby after four long hours, all of which Jen spent imagining the worst possible scenarios. Decebel wrapped an arm around Jen and pulled her to his side as they watched Thia nurse.
“She’s perfect,” Jen whispered. “I don’t care if she’s blue. She’s absolutely perfect.”
“While I would rather have her home safe with us and blue versus the alternative, I would like to see if Perizada would remove the dye. If for no other reason than to remove the constant reminder that those two pups did this to her.”
“Pups? They’re grown and married,” Jen pointed out.
“Compared to me, they’re pups,” Decebel said and then nudged her. “Make her eat faster. I want her back.”
&nbs
p; Jen rolled her eyes. “She’s not a water toy that you can squeeze and then release to pull fluid inside of her. She eats at her own pace.” Jen switched Thia to the other side and laughed when Decebel sighed. It was almost as though he thought Thia was purposefully nursing slowly. Silly wolf, Jen smiled to herself.
Just as Jen pulled her shirt down and handed Thia over to her mate, who was muttering something about it being ‘about damned time.’ Peri appeared across from them, sitting on the loveseat.
“Good, Cyn made it back safe and sound with the munchkin,” Peri said as she smiled at them. And though there was a smile on her face, her eyes were dark with a mixture of emotions.
“Are you alright, Peri?” Jen asked.
Peri nodded. “Thia is home safe where she belongs. That is all that matters.”
The door to the suite opened and in walked Sally and Jacque, their mates trailing behind them. The girls’ arms were full of food, but the moment they saw Thia, Jen’s friends dropped everything and hurried over to fawn over the infant.
“She’s safe,” Jacque said breathlessly and repeated it over and over as if saying it repeatedly would keep it true.
“Yes,” Decebel said and leaned back from the two girls. “And, no, you cannot hold her.”
Jen laughed. “Good idea. You two”—she pointed at her two best friends—“have to earn back your baby-holding privileges. And I don’t think you’ll ever get bathing privileges.” Now that Thia was safe in their home, joking about the incident would no doubt become a source of amusement for her when she got bored.
“Hey, we aren’t the ones who dyed her blue.” Sally frowned. “It was these two.” She pointed at Fane and Costin.
“Way to throw us under the bus, Sally mine,” Costin grumbled.
“To be fair,” Fane said, “you two actually planned to dye her blue. It was premediated on your part. We simply made a mistake.”
“Next time, don’t steal the baby that we stole fair and square, and you won’t mistakenly dye her blue,” Jacque said, glaring at the two males.
“So you plan on stealing other babies?” Fane asked his mate.
“Maybe,” Jacque said, pursing her lips at her mate.
“I think it would be prudent that we not encourage Jacque to add her brand of mischief to our already exciting lives,” Vasile said as he and Alina entered the suite. Alina made a beeline for Decebel, but he still did not give her up. Alina had to be content with simply getting to touch Jen’s daughter, at least for now.
“Well, if it’s not some evil, psycho supernatural making our lives difficult, or Jacque and Sally, then it’s Jen,” said Peri.
“Hey!” Jen said, frowning at Peri. “None of this disaster was my fault. Blame Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dumb.”
Sally frowned. “We were just trying to give you and Dec time to work out your crap without an interruption.”
“I wasn’t talking about you two. I was talking about them,” Jen said as she pointed at Costin and Fane.
Fane threw his hands up in the air as he groaned. “You’re never going to let us live this one down.”
“While I realize it wasn’t your fault she was taken, I will remind you on a regular basis what a dumb-butt move it was to dye my kid blue,” Jen grumbled.
“Not if I can help it,” Peri muttered under her breath.
Jen’s head snapped around to the high fae, but she hadn’t heard Peri’s words and didn’t bother to stop and ask for clarification. “And you! You have some talking to do. We’re all here, so you only have to say it once. Tell us what happened and who did this.”
“And tell us you ensured they will never be able to do it again,” Decebel added.
“Fair enough,” Peri said. “I stopped the heart of the woman who stole Thia. By some strange coincidence, the lactation nurse that Jacque found for you, Kimily Blankenship, was actually a centuries-old elf hiding among the humans. She kidnapped your daughter in the hopes of impressing some bad people,” Peri said.
“What bad people?” asked Vasile.
“I don’t want to say anything else until I have more information. But I made it clear to her that she was going to tell me who and what she was, why I couldn’t sense her magic earlier, and why she took one of mine. I threatened to turn her brain to liquid while I took the information I wanted if she refused to cooperate. We had a heart to heart, and then I sentenced her to death for her crimes. I’ll admit, some of the things she said are concerning, but they may turn out to be nothing. Vasile, I’ll discuss it with you later.”
“Kimily?” Jacque breathed the name. “I can’t believe it.”
Sally’s eyes widened. “It really is our fault,” she said softly.
“No,” Jen said, shaking her head and staring hard at her two best friends, who were beginning to look horrified. “The only fault lies with Kimily. End of story. If you two feel guilty, let me help you. I absolve you of any guilt. Boom. Done.”
“What, are you the pope now?” Peri asked dryly.
“If you’re around me long enough, you’ll swear you’ve had a religious experience,” Jen said as she smirked at the high fae.
“Listening to these ridiculous statements is far worse than a little bit of blue dye Fane and I may have, with nothing but good intentions, accidentally put on a baby,” Costin said.
“Watch it dimples,” Jen growled. “We can put it to a vote that when you and Sally and Jacque and Fane have kids we should dye them green and see how you feel about it.”
“That’s not really fair,” Sally said. “Everyone knows being green isn’t easy.”
Peri smacked her forehead. “And the jokes just get worse and worse. Can we call it a day?”
There were murmured agreements, but Jen spoke up before anyone could move. “Seriously? My daughter was kidnapped, like three times in one day, and dyed blue, and we’re just going to ‘call it a day’?” she asked, trying hard not to laugh at the looks on their faces. She’d milk it for as long as it would annoy them. Because she was Jen, and that’s what she did.
“Why are you still upset?” Sally asked. “Thia is back.”
“Because now I don’t have to be in control and levelheaded. Now I can go ape shit on you mofos.”
Peri sighed. “I wasn’t sure if I was going to have to do this, but apparently I am.” The high fae looked at Alina. “Could you step out into the hall for a moment, please? I’ll explain later.”
Alina nodded without questioning and pressed a kiss to Vasile’s cheek before stepping out of the suite and closing the door behind her.
Peri looked at Jen and then at everyone else. “I won’t be able to get your thanks for this later, but I assure you, if you were capable, you’d want to give me an award.” She muttered words under her breath in a language they didn’t speak, and the light that sometimes glowed around her began to grow brighter and brighter until the room was filled with it.
“Peri,” Vasile growled but his voice was cut off by Peri’s chanting.
“What the hell are you doing?” Jen asked as she felt the pressure in her head building. It went on for several minutes. All the while, the light in the room increased and became blinding. Then it was suddenly gone.
Peri released Decebel from the spell she’d put over him, erased any and all traces of blue dye from Thia, Costin, and Fane, and then flashed from the room, needing to arrive as if she hadn’t already been there. When she reappeared, she didn’t show herself immediately. She wanted to make sure her magic had worked. She watched as Jen blinked several times and looked around the room. Everyone else looked just as lost as she did.
Alina walked in and looked at everyone before smiling and stepping up to Vasile. “Everything okay?” he asked him. He nodded.
“What are we doing?” Sally asked.
“We were…” Costin’s words were drawn out as he seemed to have to think really hard about his answer. “Having a meeting?” He finally finished, but the statement sounded like a question.
“Were
we going to have a barbeque?” Jacque asked. “I feel like we were going to have a barbeque.”
“Well, if we’re just throwing things out there, how about we go with something like an orgy,” Jen said “I mean, let’s make it count if we can’t remember why the crap we were gathered in my suite.”
“I could go for an orgy,” Costin said with his signature dimpled grin.
“No, you couldn’t,” Sally said, smacking his chest.
“Never mind, boss says I can’t.” He sighed dramatically.
Jen nearly jumped out of her skin when Peri suddenly appeared in front of them, letting her glamour fall.
“Bloody hell, woman, don’t just pop in and out like that.”
“I’m a fae. It’s what we do,” she said and then smiled. “So, what’s going on? Having a meeting of the minds? Planning a war? Sewing party? Barbeque?”
“See.” Jacque pointed at Peri. “Even she’s down with the whole barbeque idea.”
“Sorry Jacque, but no barbeque. Actually,” Alina said, “I think maybe we should all call it a night. Jen, you look beautiful but exhausted, and Decebel looks especially snarly.”
Jen narrowed her eyes on the Alpha female. “It impresses and annoys me that you have the ability to flatter me while at the same time informing me of my lackluster appearance. And you are right. Decebel is especially snarly. Since no orgy will be taking place, you all can get your butts moving so we can put Thia down, and mamma and daddy can talk.” She grinned as she put air quotes around that last word.
“UGH.” Jacque groaned. “TMI, Jennifer. We don’t want to know your code words for your baby-making time.”
“No more babies,” Peri added quickly. “Really. Practice all you want but no more, at least not for a while.”
“Why?” Jen asked. “Thia has been easy.”
“Was it easy when she was gnawing off your nipple?” Jacque asked dryly.